Dr Allwood is the principal investigator for NASA’s 2020 Mars Rover program – the first non-US citizen to be given the honour - which will send a new Mars Rover to the red planet to test if future manned explorations could travel to Mars.

Abigail “Abby” Allwood in 2006 finished her doctorate at Sydney’s Macquarie University by proving billion-year-old rock formations in Australia’s Pilbara region held proof of Earth’s oldest life forms.

Dr Allwood began her geology studies at Queensland University of Technology, where she completed her Geosciences degree (with honours) in 2001.

She completed her honours year in 2002, before shifting to Sydney’s Macquarie University for her 2006 doctorate, which attracted the science world’s attention with ground-breaking research in the PIlbara.

“Since landing on Mars in 2004, Opportunity has made a number of discoveries about the Red Planet including dramatic evidence that long ago at least one area of Mars stayed wet for an extended period and that conditions could have been suitable for sustaining microbial life,” NASA’s Mars Rover website says.